


The Best Place Yet

by telemachus



Category: Pride (2014)
Genre: Angst, Aunty Dilys, M/M, Mother-Son Relationship, Politics, the personal is political
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-28
Updated: 2016-04-28
Packaged: 2018-06-05 02:01:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,559
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6684805
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/telemachus/pseuds/telemachus
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Emotion filled reunions are all very well, but life goes on, and on. And sometimes its the changes you weren't expecting, didn't bargain for, that are the most difficult.</p><p>Or, Gethin's mum comes down to London, when he isn't ill, and it isn't dramatic. It's just - the way life is now.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Best Place Yet

**Author's Note:**

> _Don't put your head on my shoulder_   
>  _Sink me in a river of tears_   
>  _This could be the best place yet_   
>  _But you must overcome your fears_
> 
>  
> 
> Time (clock of the heart), Culture Club
> 
>  
> 
> .

“He’s ever so good,” she says, always kind, Aunty Dilys, always, looks for the best in people and Gethin wants to shine, to say yes, yes I think so, you would not believe how long he spends on it, even for something like this, something that isn’t really art, something he’s done so many years he could do it in his sleep, isn’t he amazing, isn’t he wonderful, and – and he’s mine – mine – he loves me.

He doesn’t.

Not here, not in public.

Because – because – don’t be flamboyant, don’t show off, nobody likes a show-off, Gethin, nobody wants to hear all that fuss and nonsense – he can hear the words, feel them inside him, at some level deeper than anything else can reach. Not for us to be putting ourselves forward, looking for attention, making an exhibition of ourselves.

And all the years of learning to be different, to be himself, to fight for the things that matter – well, that doesn’t count somehow. 

After all, this – this wanting to claim, to acknowledge, to shout – this isn’t important. Not really.

He remembers, even as he thinks it, the old slogan – the personal is political – but – well, maybe not today.

Maybe today, today is for being quiet, not rocking the boat, not making waves.

So he manages a little half-smile, a shrug, acknowledging the compliment but not – not showing off.

“Must’ve taken him hours to learn to dance like that in those heels,” from next to Aunty Dilys, accompanied by a sniff, a sniff that says clearly – hours he could have spent learning a proper trade. 

Gethin bites his lip, don’t argue, don’t shout back, don’t – it isn’t worth it – do you really want to ruin everything?

It’s been so long – so many Christmases – without this, this that is still new, this that might, just might, be going to be alright – so many years without even a card – don’t spoil this visit. 

Don’t make an exhibition of yourself.

At least, not more of an exhibition than you can help, sitting here with your mother and your aunt, watching a bloody pantomime at your age. 

Matinee too – so none of the slightly more – risqué – humour that goes in to the evening version.

Just as well, really.

Bad enough having to negotiate the dates, not let on that yes there are shows on Sundays – the Lord’s Day – yes there are shows on Christmas Eve – certainly best not to let on that in the evenings the humour gets a lot more – well, funny, frankly.

Still. 

They’re making an effort – he should too.

After all, it isn’t just about him, not any more.

And still, after what, three years, Gethin hugs that thought to himself. It isn’t just about me, me and my politics, my beliefs, my ideals – it’s about – Us.

Hence the timing of the visit.

“Ask them down – well, maybe not for Christmas – but while the show’s on, Geth-love,” he said, “come on, could be the only part I get for months the way things have been recently – certainly the only one that’s decent for good chapel-going ladies from the Hillsides – if you – well – it would be nice not to have your mother thinking I’m completely unemployed, drain on your resources.”

And Gethin could see the thought underneath, the thought that’s always there, that he isn’t paying his way, isn’t the success he always dreamt he’d be – as though any of that matters, could matter, will ever matter.

These days, there’s only one thing that matters – he, Jonathan Blake, Jonathan-wonderful-beautiful-kind-intelligent-fabulously-sexy-amazing-in-bed-love-of-my-life-Blake – is alive, and well, and here, right here, in my bed when he goes to sleep and when he wakes, somewhere in my flat making a mess and singing when he’s at home, somewhere in London racketing about all day when I’m at work. It doesn’t matter where, or doing what, so long as he’s safe and alive.

Still here.

Nothing else matters.

Pathetic, really, Gethin thinks, as he stares, sightless at the antics on stage – he only has eyes for the scenes with Jonathan – pathetic to be so bound up in one person.

But there it is.

Doesn’t seem to change – at least, he reminds himself, not yet.

Because there is, hidden away, still that fear that one day, one day, something will go wrong – not the awful fear that haunts both of them, the spectre of gaunt figures in hospital beds, grieving relations – not that, just – the ordinary fear, the fear that he thought had been banished by the greater one, the fear of not being able to really love one person, be faithful, make a home and not – not just get bored.

Daft, really. To have this awful great sword hanging over your head throughout the banquet, and at the same time worry about – he searches for the right metaphor – about the temptation to flirt with your neighbour at the table.

Pretty sure Damocles wasn’t so damn stupid.

Maybe Mrs Damocles was. Or – or whatever his lover was called. They had boyfriends, sometimes, those ancient Greeks, didn’t they?

Anyway.

This fear – this fear isn’t one you can talk about, isn’t one you can banish with fund-raising, politics, campaigns, awareness posters, any of it – you can’t buy this off, insure against it somehow, can’t even admit to it.

Of course not.

You can hardly say to your – boyfriend – and what a word that is, what overtones, what feelings that invokes – you can hardly say – I know you have this awful sentence hanging over you, and I know you can hardly believe I will stay, and I know I said I would, and I meant it, I will, I do – I love you – and all the rest of it – but – I panic.

Still.

I panic, that one day, one day, someone will walk into the shop, or I’ll see someone in a nightclub, at a party, over your shoulder – and – he’ll be – better.

I don’t see how he could be. Honestly, cariad, I don’t. I’ve never met anyone better, I don’t – can’t – picture how anyone could be. You’re perfect, you’re wonderful, you’re the lover I always dreamed of but couldn’t admit I wanted.

But I still worry.

Worry that we won’t make it, that all the things I always said, believed, were true. That we just aren’t cut out for marriage – or anything like marriage – that romantic love is a lie – that we’ve just been fooling ourselves. That sooner or later we’ll revert to type.

Oh, I trust you. And not only because you have such a hard time believing in me these days, that I don’t think you’d ever believe in another.

Even if you met someone – someone lovelier than me – who was positive – and I know that would make life easier, some ways – but even then – I trust you.

It’s simply that I don’t trust myself.

I worry that this – this mythical man – might just be – different. 

And he might appear on a day when you – you were just being your usual self. Wonderful and noisy and gloriously sexy and – and so well-known.

And I don’t trust myself not to stray.

Moments like this, when he can’t help himself thinking like this, Gethin wishes he were the sort of person who could wear a ring and find reassurance in it.

Sometimes, moments like this, if he is at home, he will go to the bedroom, to the box in the drawer beside his bed and look at it, touch it – maybe even put it on, just for a moment – just to remind himself.

Enjoy the feel of it, remember the look on Jonathan’s face when he gave it to him – and again when Gethin gave him the ring he is never without – and tell himself that he doesn’t feel trapped, feel stifled – he feels safe, secure. 

Because he does, really, he does.

Of course, today, today he doesn’t have it with him.

He thought about it – thought about wearing it even, for the whole visit.

Wondered if it would reassure – if the sight of it might banish some of the more lurid tabloid stories which he supposes are swirling somewhere in the minds of his mother, his aunt. Stories of parties, stories of nightclubs with darkened rooms, stories of – of a time now gone.

Stories that no-one wants to hear about their son – that add to all the fear of the unknown, the shame, the awkwardness.

Stories that may – Gethin smiles a private tiny smile of memory – may hold some truth, but which he certainly has no intention of discussing with either his mother or his aunt. All the same, there is still a part of him that burns like a flame with anger that he should have to even consider hiding that truth – conforming as best he can to an ideology that isn’t his, that wasn’t designed for him. 

He isn’t straight. He doesn’t want to be straight, or act straight, or pretend, or conform, or – or any of it. He isn’t just – a straight man who fucks men. He’s queer. And proud of it.

So why should he wear a fucking wedding ring? 

Glad of the distraction – and isn’t this scene going on a bit? – surely the pantomime dame should be back on by now? – the only part of this whole tedious show worth watching? – Gethin retreats from the antics of the chorus of children on stage to consider this. 

He doesn’t want to wear a ring. It isn’t his style, to wear a ring day in, day out.

There’s still part of him, he supposes, that thinks – men don’t wear rings. And he winces internally at the disloyalty.

Knows that wearing the ring makes Jonathan happy – absurdly happy – that not wearing it is, in the end, a lie. Because, like it or not, he’s made those promises, and maybe not in church, maybe not in front of anyone else – but he’s made those promises to the most important person on this planet. 

And to himself, to his own integrity.

But he can’t quite bring himself to admit it to the world.

That yes, I was wrong, all those radical beliefs, all those dreams, all that revolutionary fire that wanted to tear down the institution of marriage – make everything anew – I was wrong. For me, at any rate, I was wrong.

I’ve never been happier.

But he can’t quite bring himself to wear the ring permanently, not even for just the three days of his mother’s visit.

Besides – he was afraid, in the end, afraid that it might simply provoke, might seem too much like – like pretending, might seem to be flaunting a relationship which – so far – seems to be being ignored.

As it has been every time they have spoken in this strange year.

Not – even in distress Gethin is scrupulously fair – not that his mother – or his aunt – has been in any way rude to Jonathan, or dismissive, or anything other than pleasant, shy, slightly charmed and amused. As they would be by any friend of his.

That’s the problem – the word is friend.

Nothing more. 

And somehow that really hurts – even though he keeps telling himself to take it slow, be grateful for what he has, remember that this time last year he didn’t even know for sure they were both still alive – and now, now look at them – second visit to London – they came to the hospital – and that, that moment when his mother arrived. He was feeling awful and miserable, and hurt and still, still having to be polite, to be caring, to be responsible; to be the one in control, the one thinking of everyone’s feelings; thinking of poor little Joe, just left home, hurting and horrified by what had happened, by seeing close up the effects of violent hatred, needing time with Jonathan, time to be reassured, time to – Gethin is trusting, not stupid – to indulge his crush; thinking of Sian, driven all that way, defeated, needing to be needed by more than the children, to be reassured that all this friendship and opening world was not going away. He was still the one reminding Jonathan to be sensible, to eat properly, not to smoke, not to go wandering around the hospital picking up germs – the one taking care, being responsible – and then his mother arrived.

Not that she really did anything, changed anything, but – she was there. And she brought bara brith – the same bara brith she always made – that he never really liked as much as he should, but still – it was comfort. It was always her way of showing affection, ever since he can remember. She never eats it, it was always made especially for him, for her little boy. And despite the slight shame of it, that day – that day it meant the world to him.

Even now, just thinking about it, he can feel himself smile. He is still so grateful to Jonathan for that, for not phoning himself, because that can’t have been easy, but he had the sense – the tact – Jonathan, despite appearances, can be supremely tactful – to ask Stella to phone. And Stella sounds so respectable, so educated, so – so much the kind and helpful, but slightly patronising, voice of authority, that his mother really didn’t stand a chance.

Kind of Stella, that. 

Shame really, he allows himself to think, that Stella and her politics being what they are – very commendable of course, but uncomfortable – there is not likely to be a chance of repayment in the guise of useful man.

Anyway.

Here they are, staying not in the flat – it’s too small, dear – dear! so, after all the shouting, all the silence, he is still dear, there’s nice – we’ve found ourselves a little bargain break – train included – much nicer than the coach – make a proper little treat of it – staying nearby – three whole days. 

He’s even managed to get cover at the shop – and thank goodness for friends who can help – even if it’s because they can’t see their own family – and he feels a pang for Steph, for Joe, – but between them, they can cope with anything – even if coping might take the form of pages of notes and a problem for him to sort out another day. 

At this point in his thoughts, before he can start anticipating all the possible problems those two could leave him, his attention flicks back to the stage.

Well.

To Jonathan.

Working the crowd as skilfully as ever, as able to provoke laughter in the children as their parents.

Finally the show is over, the princess marries the hero – of course – and there’s applause, and flowers for the ladies, and so on.

Flowers for Jonathan today too. Gethin made sure of that – and he’s rewarded for the toe-curling embarrassment of such a gesture by the way Jonathan’s face lights up, the look straight to where Gethin is sitting, and the extravagant, flamboyant kiss blown in his direction.

Gethin hadn’t really thought that through.

Even from here he can feel his mother tense, and whether it’s the kiss blown from his boyfriend – boyfriend – or whether just the fact that people are looking at them, he isn’t sure, but the whole thing probably counts as making an exhibition of ourselves. She doesn’t say anything for a long moment – it’s left to Aunty Dilys to say,

“That was a nice thought, dear, flowers,” trying so hard she is, trying to cover all the awkwardness, all the space between them. But actually, Gethin thinks suddenly, actually, this might be better if she weren’t here. If it was just me and Mum. 

Like it was that first time, in her kitchen. We talked – well, almost talked – then. But ever since, we’ve surrounded ourselves, protected ourselves with other people, with Aunty, with Jonathan, with crowds of strangers. 

Maybe that’s how she wants it.

Maybe that’s easier for her.

Maybe it does all just take time, that’s what Jonathan said, give it time, Geth-love, be patient. But Gethin has never really been patient.

Now they wait for everyone to leave, no point rushing in the crowd, and then head out of the theatre, Gethin acknowledging greetings from the front of house lads, and looking at his watch.

“Should be about done,” he says, “you two wait here in the warm, I’ll nip round the back, see Jonathan, get a taxi organised,” because it’s too far to walk, and the bus or the tube with his mother and aunty – no, he doesn’t have the patience for that. Better to simply not eat for a day or two later in the month, if necessary.

Not that it will come to that, things aren’t that tight. 

Not this month, not with Jonathan earning. But Gethin doesn’t let himself think like that, even hint at a rebuke.

He doesn’t.

He really doesn’t.

He won’t let himself be that person, won’t think like that. It’s only money, they have enough, they can get by – Jonathan doing what Jonathan was made to do, performing on a stage, drawing eyes, drinking in the admiration and praise – that’s worth anything.

But all the way through some snatched moments with Jonathan – he’s on stage again in two hours – all the way home in the taxi, all the rest of the evening with his mother and aunt, effortful as the conversation is, Gethin keeps returning to his realisation. Sees them back to their hotel, hangs around the stage door until Jonathan comes out. Jonathan, still in full flow, centre of a noisy group, wanting to ride the high, talking, laughing and then it’s drinks at the cast’s favoured pub, and Jonathan wants to go dancing. Apart from the unkind – it’s not good for you, not sensible, should be taking care of yourself - Gethin can’t think of a reason not to, and so it’s another night out, another late night he will pay for in the morning, but music and dancing and snogging like – like there’s no tomorrow, like this man in his arms is the gold at the end of the rainbow, is the answer to all the longings he ever had. And then rattling home on the tube, walking the last part down a quiet road, unlocking the door, up the stairs, and finally, the two of them are at home and he can say it.

“I can’t take this much longer,” he starts, and it’s only chance that makes him look up, makes him see Jonathan’s momentary flinch in the mirror over the sink, and the ease with which he can hurt terrifies him, but the only thing to do is to hide the knowledge, battle on, “this – with Mum – being with other people, all the time, she’s hiding – I’m hiding – it’s lies, it’s all bloody lies.”

Jonathan slowly shakes his head, smiles, one of those rich, warm, Jonathan-specials, those smiles that make Gethin have to bite down not to shine, not to sing, not flush and sparkle on the outside as much as he does deep down within himself.

“And people say I’m the drama queen. Just leave it, Geth. She’s trying, you’re trying, what more do you want?”

And Gethin doesn’t have an answer.

I want her to hold me. I want her to – to acknowledge you and what we are to each other. I want her not to flinch when I refer to our bedroom. I want her not to always use your name when she speaks to me about you – I want her to say ‘your boyfriend’. I want – I want things that are shaming and ridiculous. I want to take your name and stand up before everyone. I want a photo of the two of us in pride of place on her wall. 

Not an answer he can say, anyway.

Then he finds one.

“I want her to come to Pride, I want her to be the sort of mother who can say ‘I am proud of my gay son, I love my gay son, I am happy he has a wonderful partner’. And don’t bloody say ‘give it time’ again. I know, alright, I know. But I don’t want to give it time, I’ve given it twenty bloody years. I want it now.”

Because in two, three, four years’ time it might be too late. Too late for you.

And I know I won’t be able to bear it if it’s the man who replaces you that she accepts like that.

But those are words he won’t speak.

Jonathan laughs again.

“Geth-love, you’re Welsh, not American,” and then he leans forward, wraps himself around Gethin, holds him close, eyes still meeting only in the mirror, “maybe one day. But you know, it really isn’t your mother that I want to talk about right now,” and he presses close, and – and yes, oh Jonathan, yes, lets – talk – that way, right now, right here. Gethin leans back into his arms, into his embrace, into the touch of skilful hands, into the sound of beautiful words and the half-whispered poetry of love-making.

Maybe in another twenty years – maybe then.

For now, this is all that matters.

And it occurs to Gethin that actually, Mum staying in a hotel with Aunty Dilys is, right now, preferable to Mum staying in the guest room, on the other side of the thin – too thin – wall, Mum waiting to use the bathroom, Mum there at breakfast, oh Dewi Sant, no.

 

 

.

**Author's Note:**

> With thanks to Wynja2007 for the loan of Aunty Dilys.
> 
>  
> 
> And with apologies to any Americans. But in the 80s, such emotional outpourings and declarations were, i think, considered by many/most Brits to be a fairly - American - thing. Sorry. Obviously now it's post-Diana, slushy is good......


End file.
